Accenture (ACN) Outpaces Stock Market Gains: What You Should Know
Accenture (ACN) closed the most recent trading day at $189.56, moving +1.39% from the previous trading session. This move outpaced the S&P 500's daily gain of 0.25%. Meanwhile, the Dow gained 0.39%, and the Nasdaq, a tech-heavy index, lost 0.09%.
Coming into today, shares of the consulting company had lost 3.53% in the past month. In that same time, the Business Services sector lost 3.67%, while the S&P 500 lost 5.58%.
Investors will be hoping for strength from ACN as it approaches its next earnings release. On that day, ACN is projected to report earnings of $1.71 per share, which would represent year-over-year growth of 8.23%. Meanwhile, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for revenue is projecting net sales of $11.08 billion, up 9.17% from the year-ago period.
Looking at the full year, our Zacks Consensus Estimates suggest analysts are expecting earnings of $7.33 per share and revenue of $43.24 billion. These totals would mark changes of +8.75% and +9.27%, respectively, from last year.
Any recent changes to analyst estimates for ACN should also be noted by investors. These revisions help to show the ever-changing nature of near-term business trends. With this in mind, we can consider positive estimate revisions a sign of optimism about the company's business outlook.
Based on our research, we believe these estimate revisions are directly related to near-team stock moves. We developed the Zacks Rank to capitalize on this phenomenon. Our system takes these estimate changes into account and delivers a clear, actionable rating model.
The Zacks Rank system, which ranges from #1 (Strong Buy) to #5 (Strong Sell), has an impressive outside-audited track record of outperformance, with #1 stocks generating an average annual return of +25% since 1988. The Zacks Consensus EPS estimate remained stagnant within the past month. ACN currently has a Zacks Rank of #2 (Buy).
Investors should also note ACN's current valuation metrics, including its Forward P/E ratio of 25.51. For comparison, its industry has an average Forward P/E of 18.21, which means ACN is trading at a premium to the group.
Meanwhile, ACN's PEG ratio is currently 2.47. This popular metric is similar to the widely-known P/E ratio, with the difference being that the PEG ratio also takes into account the company's expected earnings growth rate. ACN's industry had an average PEG ratio of 1.6 as of yesterday's close.
The Consulting Services industry is part of the Business Services sector. This industry currently has a Zacks Industry Rank of 80, which puts it in the top 32% of all 250+ industries.
The Zacks Industry Rank includes is listed in order from best to worst in terms of the average Zacks Rank of the individual companies within each of these sectors. Our research shows that the top 50% rated industries outperform the bottom half by a factor of 2 to 1.
Be sure to follow all of these stock-moving metrics, and many more, on Zacks.com.
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